I've been a little bit of an Ostrich with my head in the sand about these emails recently, it's been quite an eventful time in the mission and I am just a little scared at the prospect of putting it on paper. But alas, here I am, humbling myself before my mom's requests and the Lord. Enjoy!
Alrighty so the timeline on this letter starts on the 13th of December. That is the day we received transfer news, when I found out I'd be coming here to Alerce! Alerce is in the Puerto Varas zone, the same zone that I came into when I came to Chile. My last few days in Osorno were very bittersweet, I was there for 6 Months and I love the people there. It was good to be able to say goodbye to the ward and the friends, Florencia actually ended up being baptized right after I left!
Alerce itself has an incredible amount of dogs (story about them below) and is part of a very beautiful part of Chile, where the Volcanos are always visible, a giant lake is nearby, and as per usual there's lots of flowers and trees.
My companion is Elder Viloria, I've served near him before in Osorno. He's Venezuelan and hilarious, he knows more jokes in English than I do. We are white washing Alerce, and between our area and getting to know the zone we've had our work cut out for us.
Pretty soon after I arrived here, we had a zone event in Fresia, where I started my mission in Chile! It was like a Christmas devotional, where us missionaries sang songs. It was awesome seeing the members again, and kinda hilarious singing Christmas carols in summer-day weather
Christmas was pretty dope here. There were lots of people that were a little more open to talking about Jesus Christ. I was a little sad at the prospect of leaving Osorno just in time for the Holidays, but the members here balled up and it's been pretty sweet. The 24th we ate dinner with the Gorostiaga family. They're cool, they live in the country and have a cool house. We had permission to stay out later if a member could take us home, so we watched a Chilean Christmas devotional and then had a Barbeque
Christmas day we had just stopped teaching pretty much the rest of the people that had been in our area book, so we weren't too sure if people would come to Sacrament meeting, but a miracle happened! Cristina and Cristofer had gotten up that morning with desires to go to a church, as they had had an incredibly tough week, and they rolled in just in time for the benediction. They were impressed with the spirit they felt, and the love from the members, and we went to their house later that day. They are so elect! We met two more times that week, and they are coming to church and the activities.
After the church meeting on the 25th, I called my fam and we opened gifts. It was pretty rad seeing Max all excited about some toy cars he opened
The 26th we had a special P day in Puerto Montt, with our zone and the Puerto Montt zone. We had a pretty normal p day full of fĂștbol and card games and such, and then afterwards we had a huge white Elephant gift exchange and a dinner together. It was cool being able to see everyone in the Puerto Montt zone again
The 28th we had a New years party with the ward, we danced and had Completos and chips and drinks. A few friends showed up, and we played fĂștbol for a bit with the youth in the ward. Side note, there are so many youth in this ward!! I love it, every Sacrament meeting there's a bunch of monkeys running around the pulpit.
On New Years eve, we had a big Lamb barbeque with the Godoy family. I hadn't had barbequed lamb before last week, it's kind of a gnarly Meat but it's pretty taste.
Love y'all! If y'all wouldn't mind praying for the following people, that'd be sweet
- Cristina and Cristofer
- Pilar Godoy
- Tatiana
- Thiare
- Adolfo Godoy
- Martina
 |
| This Sister came up to me before she saw my name tag and told me I looked just like an AP in her mission in Cordoba, Argentina. Then she saw my name and sure enough it was my dad that she knew! |
